


perennial

by eurythmix



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Development, Deradicalization, First Crusade, Flashbacks, Gen, Head Injury, Intercrural Sex, M/M, Mutual Pining, Period Typical Bigotry, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery, Slow Burn, Temporary Amnesia, more like contextual bigotry imo
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-22
Updated: 2020-10-13
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:34:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26594530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eurythmix/pseuds/eurythmix
Summary: Nicky comes back after being shot by Keane - at least, a version of him does.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 50
Kudos: 302





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this plot sprung fully-formed from my brain the _second_ i finished the old guard in july but i've put it off until now because. idk. i'm a chronic procrastinator and deeply insecure over the quality of my writing? or i've been writing my thesis. both. both is good.
> 
> needless to say, the first few chapters have a blanket cw for crusader-typical islamophobia and xenophobia because 11th century nicky is an asshole from a racist, imperialist culture. i'll provide more specific cws at the start of each chapter where applicable but i feel like it's kinda obvious going into this that the nicky we encounter at the start is _really_ shitty.
> 
> title and general vibe of this fic heavily inspired by [vera blue's album perennial](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0w8sElIq3k&list=PLPlCeFqZDUzmhAr7tFUzNQdZV8gSCPyQm&ab_channel=VeraBlue-Topic), especially [pedestal/cover me](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a5Dw37tYEQI&ab_channel=VeraBlue-Topic)

They reached the city walls by summer’s crest but Nicolò felt far from victorious. Reports of sabotage came in slowly, trickling rumours that the wells had been poisoned long before their arrival, and the already downtrodden morale continued to sour with every passing sun-baked hour. The land was as unfamiliar as the hills surrounding Antioch had been, what little rations remained were being halved and then halved again, and the wholly consuming fury that had been ignited all those years ago had petered to heavy, smouldering coals settled low in Nicolò’s stomach. Fights were breaking out, tension fractured along already taut allegiances; two men had already died at each other’s hands and Nicolò couldn’t find it in himself to be surprised. They were directionless, unmoored, ants scrambling to escape a flaming mound only to spread the fire further and burn the rest of the forest down with them.

A soldier from another outfit, vowels rolled like a Norman, sat shaken by the brawl. He had missed the earlier sieges and looked younger than Nicolò’s little sister, still soft beneath the chin and eyes watering at the growing stench of abandoned bodies. Without thinking, Nicolò approached the boy and pressed his own bedroll into his trembling hands. They shared a look, pensive and still, and Nicolò turned on his heel to leave before the boy could try to thank him. He wasn’t sure what he’d say if he did, whether he’d regret his lapse in judgement or beg the boy to run before the horror truly began. 

He elected to sleep beneath the stars, head pillows on a thatch of heath. The sky was clear, endless as the ocean, and when Nicolò raised his hands above his head he wondered what it would be like to sink his fingertips into the dark expanse, whether he could plunge deep enough to touch the face of God. _If this is what you want_ , he would whisper, tracing his thumb over His furrowed brow, _then I’d gladly die a hundred deaths in Your name_. _I am Your servant; please, show me how to serve._

The wind picked up, tickling the sweat on Nicolò’s palms. Eons away, just between the gaps of his spread fingers, the North star flickered like a firelight: a promise spoken in radiance he could never hope to understand; not in his lifetime, not in any of theirs.

Nicolò sighed and dropped his hands. Answers wouldn’t come to him tonight, if they ever would. He let his eyes slip shut, lulled by the gentle murmur of the camp around him, and fell into sleep knowing that when he’d wake, he would prove his devotion in actions more sincere than any prayer. If he was sure of anything, it was this: he was meant to be here on the eve of the siege, crossbow held steady and eyes trained to the horizon, waiting for the shadows of an unknown enemy to take shape.

* * *

_“Joe! Nicky! We’re moving out!”_

_“Assault team, move! You two, flank.”_

_He’s trying to breathe in but his throat fights the instinct. There are heavy footfalls to his left and before he can prepare himself a boot connects with his cheek, throwing him back against the ground. Another kick knocks what little wind he had out of his lungs and he’s backed against a pallet, his attacker advancing. Muscle memory takes over; he grabs his assailant by the hip and flips him over, landing a solid punch before he’s thrown back again. There’s a grunt and Joe slams the man’s head against the ground; Nicky barely has enough time to recognise his partner has come back when the attacker - Merrick’s hired right hand, the commander, the large man with an uncompromising flint of a smile - regains his balance and begins hitting Joe._

_There’s nothing quite like the rage that floods Nicky’s body, dangerous like an exposed wire and twice as volatile. He launches himself at Keane and drags down the gun he had pointed at Joe - but his ears are still ringing from the explosion, his limbs too heavy and slow, and before he realises it he’s flat on his back again with the same gun pressed between his shocked, parted lips._

_Nicky barely hears Joe’s inarticulate shout of terror and fury over the all-encompassing crack of charge to bullet, gunpowder to shell, body to ground._

* * *

“Nicolò? Love? Are you with us?”

Pain radiates from the crown of Nicolò’s head, a flat pressure against his skull that makes him wince as he’s roused from blissful sleep. He exhales hard through his nose, hands flying up to cradle his temples, and allows himself a moment of peace beneath closed eyelids before cautiously opening them to the brightness beyond.

There’s a man - warm brown skin, a smile like a sunrise, _Saracen_ \- peering at him, barely a hairsbreadth from his own face. His dark eyes are soft with concern and his palm runs the length of Nicolò’s shin in slow, comforting movements; even as incapacitated as he is, the stranger poses no challenge to Nicolò. It’s laughably easy to push the man away and pin him against the ground with one fist raised and his teeth bared.

A startled cry erupts nearby and a pair of hands try to pry Nicolò off the limp, confused body beneath him. He shrugs them off with a single-minded focus and presses his hand harder against the man’s neck, thumb flush against a thrashing, frantic pulse. 

He doesn’t have his bow, nor is his dagger strapped to his belt. No matter; Nicolò has killed men with less.

“Nicky!” the man chokes, his fingers scrambling desperately at his throat. He speaks in a foreign tongue but it doesn’t sound like the clipped timbre Nicolò heard in Antioch; it’s slower, colder, closer to the old Latin of liturgies. The frustration must show on Nicolò’s face, and with his last gasps of breath, the Saracen speaks in fluid Ligurian. “Nicolò, please, my love. Please let me go.”

Nicolò’s grip loosens with surprise. It’s enough for the man to wriggle away, coughing and retching, so that Nicolò can be dragged away by a strong forearm. It’s a woman, her sharp jaw clenched, who throws him back so hard his head bounces against the wall. She snaps something in the same strange language, staring at Nicolò like she expects him to understand her clipped words. He looks away from her, bewildered, but the room surrounding him offers no clues; everything, from the thick bed he was once lying on to the unnatural glow emanating from the ceiling, is unfamiliar. 

The woman continues to speak. She shakes Nicolò’s shoulder and grabs him by the chin, forcing him to look directly into her narrowed eyes; there’s a split second, however, where he catches sight of a small knife strapped to her hip. He waits until she readjusts her grip to pluck the knife from its sheath and bury it to the hilt in the juncture of her collarbone.

“Fuck!” she screams, and Nicolò has travelled enough to know exactly what that means. He darts away from her and launches himself at the door, the pain in his head dulled by hot blood roaring through his ears. He’s close, barely a step from freedom, when a third body collides with his and throws him against the bed.

Nicolò yells, thrashes, kicks out with both feet - but this new opponent, a younger woman with dark skin and a troubled crease to her brow, is stronger and faster. She holds his wrists above his head and shouts something to the other two, who have quickly recovered; together they pin him down with ease. They work as a single unit, fully restraining him in seconds and forcing him to face their hard gazes.

It’s the Saracen man Nicolò can’t take his eyes off. The women are wary but there’s something more terrible and sincere in the man’s eyes, a fragile flicker of trust with nothing to shield it from the wind. He’s shaking his head like he can’t quite believe what lies beneath his open palms and Nicolò’s instinct to attack, so quick to flare, quietens to a patient simmer he knows all too well. 

“Nicolò,” the man asks urgently, “do you know who I am?”

“Yes,” Nicolò replies, voice flat. “You are a defiler of Christ and an enemy of the people.”

The man flinches away from him like his very skin burns to the touch. _Good_ , Nicolò tells himself, and refuses to feel any measure of shame for the hurt written across his face. One of the women was speaking to him and this time Nicolò didn’t bother to try and decipher her strange words; he turned his head and stared stubbornly at the wall, tracing its odd patterns until she showed a moment of weakness.

But no moment comes - they continue to chatter above him, voices fraught but grip steady. They know better than to trust him now that he had shown what he was capable of. Nicolò clenches his fists, furious at his own impulsive action; if he’d waited for the right moment to strike, he could have escaped quietly and efficiently. Something had forced his hand, the anger that he had nursed since the declaration of war spiralling out of his control for briefest, most violent of seconds. It made him feel like a child again, watching his father smelt iron into bodkin points and wondering what it would be like to dip his hand into the furnace. Whether it would hurt like he knew it would or if just this once, by the grace of God, he was made of stronger stuff. These are impractical, dangerous thoughts; temptations that could only lead to pain. The Saracen man, whoever he is, makes Nicolò feel like something wild.

He promises himself in that moment that he will kill this man when he gets the chance. Not for the war, nothing quite so selfless; it’s his own liability to feel so helpless, to be so easily swayed by reckless fervour. He needs to control his anger and wield it like a blade: sharp, precisely, deadly. 

There’s a tap on his cheek and Nicolò whips his head around, lips curled. Instead of the Saracen he was expecting, though, it’s the pale woman he stabbed, her brow furrowed in concentration. “Listen to me,” she says in slow, halting Sabir. It’s not a language Nicolò is intimately familiar with, but he knows enough from his travels to parse meaning from her fumbled tongue. “You are safe. We are not going to hurt you.”

It takes Nicolò a moment to recall the right words. “I don’t believe you,” he spits. The woman’s eyes harden further.

“What do you remember?”

Nicolò clenches his jaw and glares.

“ _Nicolò_.”

“Go to hell.”

The look he receives is a shade too close to a disappointed caretaker dealing with the antics of a child. “Tell us,” she orders, voice brooking no argument. Nicolò thinks that in another lifetime he would obey - but not here, not with her hands so near his throat, her body shielding the others from view. He stays silent, chin jut high against her inscrutable expression, and waits for her patience to thin.

In his peripheral the Saracen shifts uneasily. His back is turned to Nicolò but he can pick out the tense set of his shoulders, the nervous twitch of his fingers against his ribs as he wraps his arms around himself. He’s speaking to the other woman in their rounded language, low and urgent; if he focuses he can pick up his own name, or a form of it at least, scattered among the vowels like seeds in a field. The longer they talk the less sense they make, and the mentions of Nicolò drift further and further apart. The woman glances over the man’s shoulder, hand coming up to her chest; the movement draws Nicolò’s eye to the delicate gold chain hanging from her neck and the small cross nestled to her collarbone.

Nicolò tilts his head. “I want to speak to her,” he tells the older woman. He receives the same unreadable stare in return.

“Let me speak to her,” he repeats. That cross, the apprehensive way she fiddles with the pendant - despite everything, he’s found another Christian in this hallowed land, someone he was sent to save. His flagging conviction, the despair that crept along the corners of his vision late at night and doubted the orders of his superiors, is lurching from his stomach to his throat, almost suffocating. Relief, he realises; it’s a strong, heady relief he hasn’t felt since Ma’arra.

But the older woman is shaking her head. “She doesn’t speak your language,” she says shortly. 

A low, frustrated growl slips past Nicolò’s lips. “Bullshit,” he spits, and turns to the other woman, who appraises him warily. “You are a child of Christ, are you not? _Christus_.” He nods at her necklace. “Chi Rho.”

Comprehension dawns across her face, smoothing the lines of her frown. She holds up the pendant; a clear, simple question. Nicolò nods vigorously, his own tension easing; maybe the older woman was right when she said this Christian did not speak Sabir, but at least he knows he has an ally in her. When the time is right, he will ask her to join him so that they can help each other escape this nightmare of a place. He only hopes he speaks with enough certainty to make her understand why they must leave.

For now, she stands above him, his captor. Her hand has dropped from her necklace and is balled into a fist by her side, alert and defensive; a fighting stance at rest. The Saracen man places a hand on her shoulder and says something soft in her ear but her posture does not ease - if anything, her body tightens. Nicolò can’t be sure if it’s against the man by her side, or Nicolò himself.

He turns his attention back to the older woman. Her lips are still set in the same firm line, more stubborn than proud, and she doesn’t even flinch when Nicolò stares at the stab wound weeping on her shoulder. Even in his weakened state he managed to lodge the dagger more than a knuckle deep in her flesh; the blade would have met muscle and driven any man howling to his knees. But this woman, this enigmatic warrior, doesn’t seem to notice the blood steadily leaking through her tunic. 

“I will ask one last time,” she says, careful and deliberate. “What do you remember?”

Nicolò swallows. He meets her eyes, hard as flint, and speaks the only truth he knows. “We are taking back the Holy City. Tomorrow, we burn anyone who tries to stop us.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: mild self-harm for immortality demonstration purposes, some hints at disordered eating, nicky repeating a lot of xenophobic propaganda
> 
> a huge thank you to everyone who's commented, kudos'd, reblogged, or just generally interacted with this fic - i'm blown away by the response i've received from the fandom in such a short space of time. it means the absolute world to me to hear that you're enjoying what i've written so far and i hope you enjoy what's to come!!

_“You selfish piece of shit!”_

_“Joe, leave it! Please.”_

_He hasn’t seen Joe this angry in years. The last time - and it’s difficult for Nicky to think clearly, to wade through the heavy fog that has dulled his senses from the moment he woke up in the lab - the last time was so long ago, he’d almost forgotten how quickly the ignition caught in Joe’s chest, the way it consumed his entire body like tinder to a spark._

_Almost, but not entirely._

_Booker exhales heavily. It’s not regret in his eyes, not exactly; it’s closer to disappointment. The shrugging, defeated kind, the ‘if you’d just listened to me, you wouldn’t be in this situation’ type of dissatisfaction. The icy grip of fury that sits low in Nicky’s gut seizes at the thought of what would have happened if Booker got his way, if they had never known he sold them out. When they make it out of here - and it’s going to be_ when, _not if - he’ll make sure Booker knows precisely what it means to feel like a disappointment._

_“What would you know of the weight of all these years alone?”_

_Joe’s laugh is more like a bark. “You’re a very pathetic man, Booker.”_

_“Joe, stop.”_ Not now _, he wants to say,_ not here _._ Not while Andy is -

_“You and Nicky always had each other, right?” Booker says abruptly. He’s turned to Joe as much as the restraints allow, jaw set hard and gaze steady; a martyr released to the cause. “And all we had was our grief.”_

_It’s not fair; he must know it’s not fair. What about the night your eldest son died, Nicky thinks, and Joe stayed with you until there wasn’t a wick of moisture left in your body to cry? What about New Orleans when the century turned, the backrooms of dance halls where you laughed when I lost all my money? What about Marseilles, Moscow, Melbourne - all the times you held a lit match over gasoline and begged us to let you burn?_

_In the end, it’s Joe who speaks for them both._

_“Well, now you have even more.”_

* * *

  
  


The older woman introduces herself as Andromache and promises to cut his hands off if he tries to stab her again. It’s a fair enough threat but Nicolò bristles all the same, shoulders drawn around his ears while he glares at her frustratingly impenetrable expression. He’s tempted to spit at her, but he prefers to keep his limbs intact. Besides, from the way she winces around her wounds, he knows he’s done enough damage.

He learns the names of the others, too. Andromache calls the Christian woman Nile and Nicolò is reminded of his father’s maps, spoils from Mahdia that sketched the long plains of the desert to the bountiful river flowing to the east: _Nilus_ , the provider. There’s a man Nicolò had not seen when he woke, a bedraggled mess Andromache calls Sébastien; she hesitates before introducing him, tongue stuttering over another, harder syllable before reaching the sibilant she was looking for. Nicolò knows instinctively that there’s a story hidden in her blunder, something complicated and raw; he also knows well enough when to keep his mouth shut. 

And then there’s Joe. 

“Yusuf, actually,” Andromache says over the evening meal she brought to his room. The sharp memory of ceaseless hunger gripped him like a vice the moment she set the bowl on the table and he pounced on it, uncaring of Andromache’s stare. The bread has an odd, refined texture and the stew bursts with flavours so vibrant his eyes water, but he eats it with fervour despite his body signalling that he’s full. 

He’s halfway through the meal when Andromache continues her introductions. “Actually,” she says after a pause, “he’d probably prefer that you call him Yusuf.”

Nicolò looks up from his stew. “Why?”

Andromache doesn’t answer, as he expected. He’s not sure that he would be satisfied by her response anyway; what little she tells him doesn’t make any sense. Her introductions are presumptuous, eyebrows lifted as if she’s waiting for Nicolò to tug on the threads she so carelessly trails behind her. She says they’re in Surrey, like it’s supposed to mean something to him; she says, _Nicky, you were shot in the head, you woke up and couldn’t remember us_ \- and Nicolò pushes away from the table, demanding that she leave.

She does, reluctantly. Before slipping through the door she points to an anteroom attached to his lodgings and tells him that it contains a latrine. “I’ll be back later to help you with the shower,” she adds with a twist to her mouth that could be a wry grin or a grimace, depending on the light. Nicolò scowls at her back as she shuts the door with a solid, inescapable click and mutters “shower” to himself, trying to flick his tongue around the only word in her sentence that he doesn’t understand. 

There are parts of the tale Andromache spins that don’t make sense because they’re outlandish, impossible; others because she speaks with phrases that sound like broken shards of a hundred other dialects. It’s what Nile speaks, Andromache says, _English_ , and it’s the common tongue in this corner of the world. Nicolò considers it an ugly, choppy language made of stolen words and half-truths, a patchwork blanket with gaping holes and ill-fitting repairs; he’ll try to learn as much of it as he can, for practicality’s sake, but that doesn’t mean he has to _like_ it. 

He finishes the stew quickly despite his protesting stomach and stuffs the remainder of the bread beneath his pillow. He’s tempted to go back to sleep, to let this extraordinary vision become a nightmare, but curiosity tugs him to the bathroom. It’s practical, he justifies, to know the parameters of your prison, especially one so gilded. 

Much like the room he woke up in, the bathroom is composed of unimaginably straight lines and gleaming finishes, sparsely decorated yet bespoke in its decadence. There are hints to its design that remind him of the bathhouses they pillaged on the journey through Anatolia: the rounded lip of a small tub, a window in the ceiling washing the walls with crisp light, bottles positioned by the sink that smell faintly sweet. His entry is met with a large mirror, simple but far finer than anything he’s come across, and his own eyes blink back in surreal clarity. 

If his reflection doesn’t move as he did, hands prodding where he felt his own touch, he’d think the figure in the frame a stranger. This Nicolò has hair cropped far shorter than he’s ever worn it, with a smooth, clean-shaven jaw he’s grown unaccustomed to in the years since he joined the war. His likeness is clothed in a plain shirt and trousers, and yet, like the room, its simplicity speaks of intention rather than necessity. When he lifts the hem of the shirt to examine his torso, his fingers brush against a comfortable layer of fat protecting lean, well-maintained muscle. The body he knows - the sharp jut of ribs, the diseased sores and jaundiced skin he’s been housed in for nigh on three years now - has been miraculously healed.

At least, almost healed; the thumbprint bruises beneath his eyes, inalienable exhaustion that he’s carried from birth, remain. As does the familiar pinch of his brow, the gawking arch of his nose - small features coloured in uncertainty, just as familiar as the last time he’d caught his reflection in a still pool. It was reassuring, as trivial as it was, to see the same blunted anger in this full, unblemished body. 

Beside the mirror is another window, exposing the world beyond his sterile cage. Wide, verdant fields stretch across the horizon, dotted with hedge groves and streaked with roads. Squat clouds hang low, thick and dark with a coming storm; he’s momentarily glad for the unfamiliar lodgings, if only to keep him sheltered from the rain. The glass of the window, impossibly even and clear, feels like ice against the palm of his hand - and he knows, without being told by Andromache, that he’s long since left Jerusalem. This place - this cold, wet mirage where bodies heal from years of hardship and finery adorns itself in modesty - couldn’t be further from holy. 

Returning to the mirror, he notices a near-invisible seam running through the centre and a small handle protruding from the bottom. When he pulls on it, the mirror splits into halves and reveals a cabinet neatly lined with more bottles. He picks up one at eye level, a substantive glass vessel labelled incomprehensibly, and yanks the stopper off to reveal a smaller golden cap. Perplexed, he twists the immovable plug, not noticing the tiny orifice in its side until his finger slips and presses down, spraying him full in the face with a strong, musky liquid. 

Nicolò recoils, throwing the bottle at the sink and pawing desperately at his mouth to rid his lips of the sickly taste. His eyes are burning, his senses enveloped in the overwhelming stench, and to add insult to the injury, there’s a soft snort of laughter from behind him.

Before he’s even aware of himself Nicolò has snatched the bottle from where he abandoned it, raising it above his head like a weapon as he spins to face his unwelcome visitor. 

It’s the Saracen by the door, his hands raised. “Only me,” Yusuf says with a soft smile that’s quickly dropped. His tone, fond and familiar, belays the tense posture he’s adopted. “I thought you might like to talk, now that you’ve had something to eat.”

“I’m not talking to you,” Nicolò replies bluntly. Blinking away the last of the vile sting, he sees the lingering traces of hope leech from the man’s bright eyes; satisfaction curls low in his stomach for driving it out. “Nile.”

Yusuf almost looks surprised. “Nile?”

Nicolò readjusts his grip on the bottle, digging his thumb into a groove at its base. “I want to talk to Nile,” he demands, voice steady despite being ambushed. “That is her name, yes? The Christian woman?”

“Nicky -”

Disgust surges in Nicolò’s chest, strong and furious as the day he was called to war. “My name,” he hisses, “is _Nicolò_.”

The Saracen steps back, expression closed off. “Nicolò,” he repeats, hollow and flat. There’s a downward tug to his eyebrows, the corners of his lips, his remorseful eyes; Nicolò clenches his jaw and refuses to feel sympathy for an infidel, no matter how pathetic he seems. _They will trick you_ , his commanders had said, his words rehearsed like scripture from the day they left Genoa. _They speak in lies and consort with demons. They are barbarians; all they know is hate. They are beyond saving._

The longer he spent in the holy lands, the quieter the conviction became. Still, when Nicolò slit the throat of a man running from the carnage in Antioch, he refused to feel pity for his dying pleas for mercy - and he refuses to feel it now.

Nicolò raises his chin and meets Yusuf’s mournful gaze. “I know exactly what you are,” he says steadily, “and I will not be tempted by you. Your lies will not work on me. Do not speak to me again.”

Something indescribably painful crosses Yusuf’s face. He’s frozen by the door, one hand still outstretched, his fingertips just barely shaking - and then it withdraws, a single, sharp motion like he’s been stung, and stuffs it in the pockets of his outer tunic. He opens his mouth to protest but nothing comes; he looks lost, bereft, like the words have been snatched from beneath his tongue. Nicolò is reminded of a boat adrift without wind, sail deplete, rudder useless, vulnerable to the riptides that draw it further and further from land. It is kinder, he knows, to hang yourself from the mainsail than wait for a rescue that won’t come. In a brief moment of weakness, he wonders if Yusuf knows this too.

A nod, curt and abrasive. Yusuf turns and walks out the bathroom, past his bed, his gait halting like he’s been struck. Finally, when he reaches the door, he glances back - and for the first time, Nicolò notices that his eyes are more than a simple brown. Smoky quartz, he thinks, or the fresh soil of spring’s harvest; deep, rich tones baked in gold, the sun reaching into the earth with rough-hewn hands and holding fast as warmth seeps through the gaps in its fingers. 

Yusuf ducks his head. He’s long gone before Nicolò can put a name to the ache he leaves behind. 

* * *

“You have questions.”

Seated on the bed with his back against the wall, knees drawn up to his chest, Nicolò doesn’t reply. His attention is fixated on the menacing axe laid across Andromache’s thighs as she sits opposite him, her hands loose on the arms of the chair but all too ready to strike. Nile stands by her shoulder, face calm despite the nervous tap of her boot; she too has a weapon, a dark, blocky mechanism Nicolò has never seen before. There’s a sheath attached to her hip, hidden in the chair’s shadow. 

Yusuf is not present. Nicolò’s shoulders relax.

“Nicolò?”

“Where am I?” he asks slowly, careful to enunciate clearly. Andromache inclines her head in acknowledgement. 

“We are far from Jerusalem,” she says. Like before her Sabir is a splintered mosaic, no more elegant than Nicolò’s - they’ve worked out a middle ground despite it, a uniquely incomprehensible language that exhausts them both to speak. It was infinitely easier with Yusuf, but Nicolò would rather die than admit it. “We are in England.”

“England? How?”

“Nicky -” Andromache sighs. “Nicolò. The year is 2020. You have been travelling with us for a long time.”

Nicolò scoffs, pulls his knees in further. “Bullshit.”

Andromache shoots him a weary look. “Are you going to call everything bullshit?”

“When it’s bullshit, yes.”

She mutters something beneath her breath; Nicolò may not know what language, but he can recognise a curse when one is levelled against him. “If you’re going to lie, at least make it believable. _2020_ ,” he sneers. “What else? What other impossible things are you going to try and trick me with? That men can fly, perhaps, and that’s how I arrived here?”

Andromache raises an eyebrow. “You’re getting warm,” she deadpans. 

“Don’t _mock_ me. I want to know how I got here.”

“I told you - you were shot. We got you out of there, brought you to Copley’s house. You’re safe here until you finish healing.”

Nicolò buries his head in his hands. “You’re not making sense,” he groans, gripping the short strands at the crown of his head. His hair feels soft, cleaner than he can remember it being; another detail, innocuous in its form, that muddies the already disturbed waters. Trying to understand where he is, what has happened, is like sifting through the riverbank for a lost treasure that has long since drifted away.

A hand lands on his shoulder, thumb rubbing across his collar. He raises his head just enough to recognise that it’s Nile, her expression wary but sympathetic. She says something to Andromache, who nods sharply and translates: “Nile says she understands your confusion. She says...” Andromache pauses, consults Nile again. “She says it’s okay if things don’t make sense now, that you’re with people who will take care of you and help you through it. Just - hear us out.” Her lips twist. “Have faith.”

Nicolò glances at Nile, her hand to her reassuring gaze. There’s strength there, he recognises; the kind of stone-carved courage that comes from only recently emerging from battle, hardly victorious but still intact nonetheless. He wonders what has happened to her, to make her so kind when she could be cruel. What kind of world she lives in, how she remains steady despite it.

He inhales, holding the breath in his throat until it hurts. “Even if I believe you,” he says, “how can I possibly be alive after all this time? Shouldn’t I have died centuries ago?”

Andromache nods. “Nile?”

Before he can realise what’s happening, Nile’s hand has left his shoulder and reached for something strapped to her opposite thigh. It’s the dagger he stabbed Andromache with the previous day, sharpened and cleaned; with a swift motion, Nile drags the blade against her forearm, hissing as it draws a thick line of blood. 

Nicolò scrambles forward, hands held out. “No!” he shouts, alarm streaming like poison through his veins, “Don’t -”

But Andromache stands and blocks him from leaving the bed. “Watch,” she instructs, pointing at the wound Nile holds gingerly against her chest. Nicolò tries to push her away, chest constricting; it’s a deep cut and bleeds freely, not enough to kill but sure to hurt. He glances around for something to stem the flow - the blanket folded at the end of the bed is too thick for a bandage, but maybe if he cut the sheets -

Andromache grips his jaw and forces him to stare directly at Nile’s wound - at least, what should be a wound. It can only be described as a miracle, the way her skin stitches together and becomes whole, no signs of a cut to be seen beyond the blood dripping from her wrist. She’s murmuring to Andromache, her tone chagrined; Andromache huffs a short laugh in reply. 

“Holy mother of God,” Nicolò breathes. “You people are insane.”

For the briefest moment, a real smile flickers across Andromache’s face. “You have no idea,” she says, clapping him on the shoulder.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> note the new explicit rating!

_Joe startles when the doors are slammed open but Nicky stays entirely still, breath held tight between his teeth. It’s not the doctor again - at least, not her alone. Andy is sagging against the guard dragging her across the tiles, her eyes listless; something cold slips down Nicky’s throat when he realises that Booker, following close behind, isn’t even putting up a fight._

_There’s blood on Andy’s shirt - fresh, continuous blood flow. She groans as she’s shoved onto one of the vacant beds and Nicky’s heart sinks through his chest, down the rafters, all the way down to the very basement of the building. In a paralysing instant he knows, without detail, what is going to happen._

_“What happened?” Joe asks, straining against the restraints to get a better look. He must know too; the lines around his eyes are tight, pleading. If this is a nightmare, those lines say, try harder. He and Nicky have thought about this eventuality too much to believe it would happen without fanfare. There’s no explosion, no dazzling display of grace and fury. It feels wrong in a way Nicky hasn’t felt in centuries._

_“She’s not healing,” Booker grits out. His arms fall neatly by the bed’s straps; an offering. “I killed her.”_

_He doesn’t recognise Booker’s admission for what it is. Instead it’s grief, thick and suffocating, that forces his head back and his eyes closed; in his peripheral Joe collapses in on himself, mouth parted in numb shock. This is it - of all the deaths, this is it. The doctor pulls back Andy’s shirt to reveal a shot clean through her abdomen; a warning, usually. A wound that should have healed before the bullet even hit the ground._

_Nicky swallows. He can feel the pieces coming apart, the scene unfurling like a film reel gone to seed; betrayal, the oldest language he knows, stabs him in the solar plexus. If he weren’t held down, he’d double over with the weight of it._

_“I need to get a line in her and stop the bleeding,” the doctor says dispassionately. She moves around Andy like she’s unconscious, like her eyes aren’t following every movement with resignation. Across the room, Merrick nods._

_“Keep her alive at all costs,” he instructs, gravely serious. If he didn’t know any better, Nicky would think he sounded like he actually cared. “Don’t you see? Between Sudan and now, something’s changed. Find out what.”_

_The doctor attaches a line to Andy, fiddles with the machines behind her. “This will stabilize her, but I have to stitch her, give her antibiotics.”_

_A slippery, almost pleased look settles on Merrick’s features. “Good,” he says with a small, self-satisfied grin - and if there were any lines he shouldn’t have crossed, that was it. Nicky rolls his head against the neck rest, turns the full force of his impassive stare to the man by Andy’s side._

_“All things die.”_

_It’s almost amusing how Merrick freezes, his jaw slack like Nicky has physically ripped the floor from beneath his feet. “What was that?”_

_“Everything has to die, Mr Merrick,” Nicky says softly. He meets Merrick’s gaze, making sure not to even blink as he stalks across the lab. “The only reason we haven’t is that it’s not our time yet.” He pauses and breathes in through the reality of what he’s about to admit. “If it’s now Andromache’s, nothing you can do will stop it.”_

_“You’d be surprised by what my products can do,” Merrick rebukes, as if Nicky is cowed by the vials and syringes his doctor has threatened them with. Every century produces someone like Merrick, convinced their machinations have bested God’s design - and every century, Nicky finds these little trinkets and crushes them under his heel like the playthings they are._

_Merrick strolls closer, his attention diverted. “I will carve slices off you for years to get what I want,” he says, eyes trailing over Joe’s torso with clinical detachment, like Joe is nothing - like he’s less than nothing, a piece of meat strung up by his heels, waiting to be butchered. The numbness in Nicky’s chest is overwhelmed with fury, so bright and hot it pales everything else in the room. Merrick looks back at him, nose lifted. “Your time is coming.”_

Turn your back on me _, Nicky promises,_ and I will snap your spine in two _. “As is yours,” he says instead, picturing the satisfaction of feeling bones shatter beneath his fingertips. Merrick’s face drains of colour and Nicky smiles, serene._

* * *

Nicolò scrubs a hand over his face, dragging down the skin beneath his eyes. “Once more,” he asks, “slowly.” With a sharp look from Andromache, he adds hastily, “Please.”

To her credit, Andromache doesn’t even sigh. “We can’t die,” she says for the fifth time in as many minutes, “not permanently. We don’t age and we don’t stay injured.”

“But not you,” Nicolò points out. He nods to the bandage peeking from her collar, unerringly white and crisp against the dark blue of her shirt. He can tell Andromache is trying to pretend it doesn’t exist, that the faintest speckle of red isn’t seeping through and making her wince with each sharp movement. “You still bleed.”

She arches an eyebrow at him. “Yeah, and thanks for that.” It’s bait, a friendly barb that doesn’t scratch; a kind of call and response waiting for Nicolò to swipe back with claws sheathed. He ignores it, looking instead out the window. 

Night fell somewhere between Nile’s macabre demonstration and Andromache’s rehearsed explanation, and Nicolò finds himself perturbed that he can’t see the stars. Maybe it’s the three years of intermittent camping, or the faint brush of memory from when he stayed up late listening to his mother’s stories, but there’s something unnerving about the thick blanket of darkness that envelopes the sky here. The only light comes from the ground, glowing beacons dotted across the horizon, captured in the sleek lines of houses much like this one; nothing quite as reassuring and steadfast as the aid of Orion’s broad-shouldered repose, nothing quite so certain. He wonders how, with a sky as desolate and empty as this, he’s supposed to find his way home.

Nile draws his attention by re-entering the room. She had slipped out earlier with a closed-lipped smile and in the scant few seconds she opened the door, Nicolò glimpsed someone leaning against the balustrade: Sébastien, arms crossed and brow perpetually furrowed. Nicolò hasn’t spoken with him, doesn’t know where he fits with this menagerie of miracles, but senses an air of discomfort about him that suggests they won’t converse for a while yet. He doesn’t dare ask Andromache why she refuses to look him in the eye.

“For you,” Nile says in clumsy Greek as she offers a bundle, shooting a glance at Andromache to check if she said the right thing. It wouldn’t make a difference if she had misspoken; what little Greek Nicolò knows is whatever he can parse from Sabir, the common words that are shared from coast to coast. Still, he offers her his own smile, tight but polite, and accepts the bundle. It’s clothing, he realises belatedly, much like those he woke up in - but there’s a lingering scent attached to the collar of the shirt as he raises it to his nose, something warm and musky that gnaws at the edges of his memory. He drops the shirt abruptly when he notices Andromache staring. 

“What?”

“Nothing.”

 _I should have stabbed her harder_. “Are we done?”

Andromache is silent for a lengthy moment, her eyes narrowed, assessing. Whatever she finds makes her exhale heavily and stand. “We’re done,” she says, swinging the axe from her lap across her shoulders. She moves to the door, Nile half a step behind her, and has one hand on the handle when she throws her parting words over her shoulder. “Get some sleep. You look like shit.”

“And your mother is a whore,” Nicolò mutters under his breath, but Andromache has long since shut the door behind her. He doubts she would even be offended if she had heard, unflappable as she’s proven herself to be, and the frustration seething low in his gut threatens to bubble over. He feels like a coddled child, fed scraps of truth that are easy to swallow; he wants it all, the meat and gristle, the uncompromising candour of whatever he’s landed in this time. He indulges himself in visions of pounding his fists against the door, screaming ‘til his throat is raw: _don’t you know where I’ve been, what I’ve done_ ? _Don’t you know what I am?_

Patience - he must have patience. He begins pacing the room, mapping its contours beneath bare feet, head bowed in what could be mistaken for prayer. With the muted squeak of floorboards centering his breathing, he constructs his own homily from the fragments of what he knows to be true.

When King Darius the Mede was tricked into self idolatry, he was forced to throw his closest advisor Daniel to the lions for his unwavering devotion to the God of Israel. “May your God,” said the king, breathless with guilt, “who you serve continually, save you!’; still, he turned from Daniel and sealed the maw of the den with stone and the ring of his fathers. That night he couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep, couldn’t bear the weight of blood on his robes. At first light he made for the den, intent on prostrating himself before the body of his dearest - but his sorrow was met with Daniel, upright by the entrance, his lions asleep, smiling like the first break of sunlight above the horizon.

“O king,” Daniel whispered, “live forever. My God sent his angel, and he shut the mouths of the lions. They have not hurt me, because I was found innocent in his sight.” He cupped Darius’ cheek, collected his tears in the crease between his thumb and forefinger. “Nor have I ever done any wrong before you, O king.”

Nicolò had offered his hands to war, his heart to the Church. When they told him to march, he marched. When they told him to kill, he killed. He had walked among the lions for years, waiting for his faith to be proven; each night he fell asleep with their jaws locked around his throat, breath hot and rancid, testing him. _Where is your God? Is this what He wants?_ No angels had come and still Nicolò fought for the morning the skies would part and his own Darius would kneel before him, repentant and beautiful. _You have been good_ , his king would say, _you have crawled through the desert on your knees and if you let me, I will spend an eternity on mine, asking for your forgiveness._

He expected to die before ever hearing those words. In a strange way, surrounded by stranger things, he still does. But if he was being tested before, surely this is his final trial; his last chance to serve a calling bigger than his body, higher than his soul. 

Nicolò places his hands against the window, watches as his reflection blurs and multiplies. He breathes in, careful and slow; out, in a savage push. Whatever comes of this, he thinks, there will be a reason. One day the stone will be upturned and there will be light on its underside, smiling, waiting for him in turn.

* * *

Sleep finds him in disjointed snatches, no more restful on a comfortable bed than it had been on bare ground. There are stretches that float like dust motes, his body weightless and disconnected, moments that are almost peaceful. He hovers in these featherlight junctures, not entirely asleep, eyes just barely shut.

Then, slowly, the dust settles into shapes, figures; the outline of a shoulder flush against a wall, the soft brush of freckles across warm brown skin. Nicolò sinks into the feeling of fingers tracing the slats of his ribs, a thumbnail catching his nipple, a heated exhale skimming his breast. He smells early evening jasmine in the curve of a collarbone and chases the scent, nosing against a sweat-spotted pulse point and breathing in its heady summer perfume.

Pieces of the scene come to him like the tides, surging up and pulling back to reveal stretches of undiscovered country. There, as the water recedes: a crown of curly hair thrown against the sheets, exposing a neck so golden Nicolò cannot bear to touch it with his hands alone. He presses his lips against it instead, drags his teeth across the jut of an Adam’s apple, licks a long, possessive stripe from clavicle to bristled chin. Again, the sand clears: there are pupils blown wide, a mouth slack with want, hands greedy and searching. A low, ragged voice, so deep he can feel it soak like honey through his bones: _Nico, Nico, my love, my life_ -

Nicolò shushes it, soothes his thumb over a rosy cupid’s bow. The tip slips inside, traces the shape of sharp incisors, drags down until he has the jaw nestled in his palm. His free hand comes up to cup the base of the skull, cradling it, holding his entire world in a grasp so gentle, it could only be born from an abundance of violence. 

Hands on the small of his back reel him closer. He’s enclosed in these arms, steady and sure, and every ounce of tension in his muscles surrenders to be held by them. Safety feels like strong thighs trembling between his knees, a belly soft to the touch that flexes hard beneath his hand, the tickle of a chest hair rubbing against his own raw, sensitive skin. Nicolò’s hands drop to broad shoulders, fingertips like claws to the meat of a scapula; he leaves notches with his nails that melt as soon as they bloom, red crescents so fine he wants to spend a lifetimes pressing mark upon mark until they stick. 

He grinds down, humming with need, and moans when his cock meets the crease of those thighs, angled just wide enough to rut between. The dry rub of cotton is replaced with slickness, so instantaneous Nicolò reels with the sudden intimacy of fucking down on bare skin. He whimpers, overwhelmed with sensation; there are lips pressing featherlight to his temple, calloused hands guiding his hips, praises whispered against the shell of his ear. _Nico, my sweet_ \- the pressure building at the base of his spine has him dizzy and love-drunk, skin tight with the fullness of being - _my heart, my moon_ \- and there isn’t a sky worth living under that doesn’t let him feel this good, this honest, this complete - _my everything, my Nicolò_.

Kisses cluster above his sternum, his breast, the notch at the base of his throat; every touch sets his skin alight and he offers more, arches his chest to the fire and opens his body to its hunger. He’s going to collapse, the last traces of an exploding star lost to the whorls of a galaxy that won’t even remember his name - and he wants it so desperately there’s nothing on earth that could stop him from holding fast and letting himself be consumed.

He feels lips curl into a grin, wide and dazzling, against the corner of his mouth. _I have you_ , they say, _I have you until the world ends, and even then. I have you, Nicolò; I always have._ They slip lower, laving at the crux of his jaw. _Do you trust me, love?_

 _Of course_ , Nicolò cries as the details begin to slip through his fingers, returning to dust. _God help me, I always will._

He looks down at his hands, empty, and blinks; the hazy light of dawn softens the room, allows him to pretend he’s still wrapped in a warm embrace. There’s a damp spot on the sheets and sweat covers him in a film, clinging tight to the folds of his clothes. There’s a chill in the air despite the bizarre mechanism bolted to the wall that emits a constant low heat, and Nicolò rubs his arms, curls further in on himself. Shame, as cold and potent as the first bite of winter, winds its way around his spine and squeezes tight, wringing the last warm traces of his dream from his throat. When he swallows, all he can taste is ash.

There’s a hesitant knock at the door. Nicolò wipes at his eyes, sits further up in the bed, and grunts.

It’s Sébastien, shifting uncomfortably. “Hello,” he says after a lengthy pause. It takes Nicolò a few seconds to realise he’s speaking Latin - _Ecclesiastical_ Latin - in awkward, rusted clumps. He reminds Nicolò uncomfortably of lessons at the seminary, thousands of miles and years departed, stuttering over words no one had spoken for centuries. “Andromache...you. Sermon.” 

The sudden absurdity of the situation feels like he’s fallen off a horse. “Sermon?” Nicolò repeats, dumbstruck. Maybe he _has_ sustained a blow to the head. Sébastien groans and knocks his forehead against the door, muttering what sounds like a lengthy, florid curse.

“No, no sermon - talk. Plan.” He gestures with a free hand; in the weak morning light, Nicolò can just make out the glint of a metallic flask. “For staying. Work.”

Indignation gives him an excuse to glance away, chest puffed. “She’s mad if she thinks I will work for her.”

There’s a long, exhausted sigh. “Speak Latin,” Sébastien instructs slowly, like he’s talking to a child - or perhaps he is the child, clumsily shaping his mouth around a barely resurrected language. Nicolò shoots him a disparaging look.

“Go fuck yourself.”

Sébastien stares at him. “Okay. _Don’t_ speak Latin.”

“Why did she send you?” Nicolò demands. It’s the anger that comes from humiliation propelling him to his feet, throwing his hands wide and frenzied. He doesn’t care what he’s saying, what language he slips into, how close he comes to smacking Sébastien in the face; his embarrassment burns twice as hot as anything else, flaring bright and terrible. Any plans he had of a calm and collected negotiation evaporate the moment he shoves a finger at Sébastien’s chest and starts to shout in earnest. “She wants me as her servant, perhaps? Her slave? No. You will tell her that I don’t consort with the likes of you or that filthy fucking Saracen, understood? _Nothing_ you can say will change my mind.”

Sébastien glances over his shoulder. “Nicky -”

“And I’ve told you,” Nicolò screams, the floodgates utterly decimated by the strength of his fury, “that’s not my name! I’m not your fucking Nicky, do you hear me? Whoever you’ve mistaken me for, that’s -” he takes a ragged breath in, his whole chest trembling, “that’s not me. My name is _Nicolò_. I’m a _soldier._ You don’t - you don’t know what I am.” He looks desperately to the window, hoping to catch a glimpse of his reflection to ground him, but the sun has begun its ascent and light floods the surface of the pane. He’s met with a quiet field, the gentle pink of dawn, a world untouched. “You have no idea who I am.”

“Yes, I do.”

It’s not Sébastien.

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr](http://eurythmix.tumblr.com)


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